Healthcare has displaced Retail as the largest employer in the United States

Some 16.2 million people now work in the Healthcare sector in the United States. Healthcare has displaced Retail as the largest employer in the United States and has been the biggest job creator since the 1990s. 10.8% of all nonfarm jobs are now in healthcare. Here’s a graph of the growth of healthcare jobs,

Healthcare as a percentage of total nonfarm jobs,

And a graph of growth of all nonfarm payrolls,

Job addition of healthcare jobs vs total nonfarm payrolls,

Jobs in healthcare vs retail,

Jobs in healthcare (as a percentage of total jobs) vs retail (as a percentage of total jobs),

We will write about how big healthcare has become in the U.S. later during the year but just one thing – healthcare is now the second largest expenditure for households in the United States just behind housing and utilities. At the current pace, healthcare will likely be the largest expenditure of households in the United States within the next decade.